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NASA Announces Next Mars Mission

Posted by kdawson on from the next-planet-from-the-sun dept.

Grant Henninger writes "Today, NASA announced their final selection for the Mars Scout 2013 mission: Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN. MAVEN will provide the first direct measurements ever taken to address key scientific questions about Mars's evolution by measuring characteristics of its atmospheric gases, upper atmosphere, solar wind, and ionosphere. The mission, estimated to cost $485M, is scheduled for launch in late 2013."

2 of 152 comments (clear)

  1. Re:In other news... by yourexhalekiss · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I actually cannot believe how inexpensive NASA's missions are. It costs just $485M to go to Mars, and how many billions or trillions of dollars to invade Iraq? Seriously, NASA's missions recently have been a bargain.

  2. Re:What about digging too? by LordVader717 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If you have a government overseeing everything then you just have one big possible point of failure as opposed to just smaller points of failure.

    Care to elaborate how the Credit Crisis is a "small point of failure"?

    but massive government oversight of peoples' lives and dealings, whether they be business or personal (not like the distinction is meaningful or real) is ever really a just or good idea.

    Yeah, because giving a democracy the power to do something as radical as keep a stable currency is such a huge intrusion. We should all be scribbling our own IOU's to pay for things. Works much better./sarcasm